Within the field of absorbent articles, considerable efforts have been made for many years to permit an increase in the quantity of manufactured articles, for example baby articles or incontinence pads, per unit of volume, which is of great importance in connection with warehousing and transport. For example, twice as many baby articles are transported per lorry today compared with the number transported on a lorry of similar size several years ago.
On one hand, the above efforts involve providing thinner articles with an unimpaired high absorption capacity. Greater thinness has been achieved essentially by the introduction of gelling, so-called superabsorbents in an increasingly high concentration into the absorption bodies of the absorbent articles. This has resulted in improvements with regard to both storage and transport handling of the articles. Thinner absorbent articles have also been met with a positive response from their users, which has naturally also influenced various manufacturers to aim at developments in this direction.
On the other hand, the above efforts involve compressing the articles to a significantly greater degree than previously. Documents EP 0,122,042, GB 2,264,278 A, EP 0,780,325, WO2005/063597 and WO2005/063596 all relates to this compressing step.
A feature common to all packs that comprise firmly compressed absorbent articles is the difficulty in removing the first articles from the pack module. The article, in particular the first article, to be removed from the pack is in contact with (an) adjacent article/articles under high pressure and has surfaces which often exhibit relatively high friction with adjacent articles, as a consequence of which the force required to remove the first articles is high. Moreover, the fact that it is difficult to grip the firmly compressed articles when they are to be withdrawn from the pack also makes the removal of articles from the pack more difficult.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,934,535, WO 95/21107 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,377,837 disclose some methods for removing one article from a stack of articles by providing an opening on the top of the pack containing the stack so that the top part of the firmly compressed stack of absorbent articles extends beyond the top edge of the pack after the pack has been opened. The result is that the top part of the articles included in the stack is permitted to expand like a fan. However it is difficult to control all the remaining articles in the pack.
WO2006/025769A1 relates to an arrangement for removing an absorbent article from a stack of absorbent articles, wherein the arrangement comprises a gripping device provided in the form of a separate strip of material. One or two articles are drawn out first by friction between the strip and the article. In another embodiment, the strip is attached to the surface of the article.
In this arrangement, the gripping device is an additional strip and made by special materials to exhibit desired friction force for removing the article. The strip should be discarded after the article is drawn out.
There are disadvantages in the arrangement of WO 2006/025769. An additional strip increases the amount of material needed and increases the cost of the articles. In addition, the gripping device constitutes a piece of garbage after use which provides a negative environmental impact. In one of its embodiments, the attachment of the strip to the article is permanent by means of an adhesive, which makes separation of the article and the strip difficult. Another problem is that it is difficult to locate the components needed for attaching the first article on the wearer i.e. to find the belt. It is difficult to locate one single belt located somewhere in a bag together with a large number of absorbent articles.
Therefore, there is still a need for an arrangement for removing a firmly compressed absorbent article from a pack of articles.